This blog began through a NIFA grant for Missouri Beginning Farmers. It continues today as a way for beginning farmers to learn about new ideas and to hear about upcoming events of interest. It is maintained by Debi Kelly (kellyd@missouri.edu).

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As an Extension Associate with the University of Missouri, I work with beginning farmers, small farms, alternative agriculture and organic farming. I am also the Co-coordinator for the Missouri Sustainable Agriculture and Research (SARE) Education Professional Development Program (PDP).

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Monday, June 30, 2014

Chinese High Tunnel Part of Innovation at Missouri Teaching Farm

Curtis Millsap in the Chinese High Tunnel on his
southwestern Missouri farm

You
can get just about anything you want at Millsap Farms, including an education
about market farming.

Curtis
Millsap estimates that he and his family, and a crew of interns, feed about 200
families on 2.5 acres of his 20-acre farm near Springfield. While another seven
acres of the farm sometimes includes sheep, poultry and cattle, it's the
vegetable operation that supports Millsap, his wife Sarah and their nine young
children. Millsap utilizes two greenhouses and three seasonal high tunnels to
grow produce year-round, which he sells through the Farmers Market of the
Ozarks and to 75-100 Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) customers.

One
of Millsap's high tunnels is a Chinese high tunnel, which he built with funding
through a Conservation Innovation Grant (CIG) from the USDA's Natural Resources
Conservation Service (NRCS). Previously, Millsap received $4,878 from NRCS to
install a conventional seasonal high tunnel through NRCS' Environmental Quality
Incentives Program.

There
are hundreds of seasonal high tunnels in Missouri, including nearly 500 funded
by NRCS, but Millsap's Chinese high tunnel is the only one in Missouri, and one
of only a few in the United States. Millsap received $20,000 from a $50,000 CIG
obtained by the Watershed Committee of the Ozarks to build the Chinese high
tunnel, pay for energy renovations in other greenhouses and to establish a
grazing system.

The
Chinese high tunnel differs from other seasonal high tunnels in that one of the
long sides of the 23x70-foot structure and both short ends are heavily
insulated with concrete and soil.

"One
of the things the CIG did was improve our efficiency in the high tunnel,"
Millsap says. "It is warmer in the morning and warmer in the evening (in
the Chinese high tunnel) than in the other greenhouses. But what's interesting
is that midday, it is cooler in there than in the other greenhouses. This thing
never spikes. It has a smooth curve, which is better for plants."

Millsap
says the different design is popular in China, where energy is expensive and
labor is cheap.

"I
was looking into the future and thinking that energy is not going to get
cheaper, so it made sense," Millsap says. "And this is a teaching
farm, so I have the workers."

Millsap's
workers include seven apprentices who are compensated with room and board, a
farming education and a stipend.

"These
are people who seriously want to experience this and see if they want to be
farmers," Millsap says. "We've been doing this for seven years. I've
had 20 apprentices, and seven are still actively involved in agriculture."

The
farm also serves as a site for farm tours and other community events, all
intended to further the buy-local movement. USDA promotes the movement through
its "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food" campaign.

"We
have this great promotion in 'buy local,' but that will go away if we can't
meet demand," Millsap says. "We try to get as many people out to the
farm as we can, show them what farming is about, maybe get their hands
dirty."

In
southwestern Missouri, where soils tend to be high in clay and rock content,
growing vegetables sometimes requires different techniques.

"We
have a few obstacles here with shallow soils," says NRCS District
Conservationist Mark Green. "We call this soil with substance."

Millsap
overcame the shallow, rocky soil obstacle by building raised beds inside the
high tunnel.

Not
raised on a farm, Millsap says he learned to farm by attending conferences, by
reading and by visiting with lots of other farmers. He says it was something he
found himself called to do.

"It's
not something I was looking to do, but sometimes when you are called, you
better listen,"